Edward G. Boehm Jr., Ed.D., who guided Keystone College from the brink of closing and put it on the path to becoming a university, said Monday he will step down as school president at the end of the current academic year.

Dr. Boehm will retire after 18 years as president on June 1, then assume emeritus status and focus on fundraising to increase the school's endowment.

"If you were aware of Keystone College 17 years ago when he first came here, it's survival was really in danger," said Tim Speicher, a 1972 Keystone graduate and chairman of its board of trustees. "Ned literally picked it up and made it what it is today. â¦ This is one of the rare occasions when a leader is going out at the top of their game after many great accomplishments."

Ned is Dr. Boehm's nickname.

Dr. Boehm announced his decision at a faculty and staff forum Friday, but the school did not announce his retirement until Monday. He is the longest-serving college president in the region and his tenure as president is the longest of Keystone's nine presidents.

Dr. Boehm, 70, said he decided to retire because he can leave knowing the school is in good shape academically and financially. The decision was strictly his own, he and Mr. Speicher said.

"In a way, it's the hardest time to leave, but it's also the best time to leave because everything is in place," Dr. Boehm said. "We've taken a long trail, but it's been exciting, and now it's time to step aside and let someone else have the honor of being president of Keystone College. What's nice about this is you're not with me yet."

"Actually, there were a lot of people who didn't want to see Ned leave," Mr. Speicher said.

Dr. Boehm, a Maryland native, arrived at Keystone in 1995 after six years as senior vice president for institutional advancement at Marshall University in Huntington, W. Va. In an interview Monday, Dr. Boehm said, an educational search firm, Academic Search, hooked him up with Keystone and he was interviewed by school officials at the Inn at Nichols Village in South Abington Twp.

"I knew some of the people there (at Academic Search) and they knew that I wanted to be a college president," he said. "They thought it was going to be a good match. They were doing the search here and asked me to apply, which I did, and the rest is history."

After his interview, he said, he drove out to the school, started talking to students and faculty members about it and sensed "a dedication and loyalty" that made him believe the school could survive.

Then a two-year junior college, Keystone was struggling as he arrived. Enrollment was just 376 students partly "because the number of students wanting to attend a two-year private school had dwindled," he said.

"Let's say it was in serious financial straits," Dr. Boehm said. "And so we knew we had to build enrollment, we had to build endowment, we had to rebuild buildings. But we had an infrastructure (existing buildings) here."

An endowment is the pool of money each school has to provide scholarships and other financial aid.

The main strategy for survival was converting the school to a four-year college, Dr. Boehm said.

He remembered addressing the school's faculty early on and telling them that for three years no one would receive tenure or raises while also assuming a "two-course overload."

"This faculty thrived on making this happen," he said. "When we saw what we had to do, they had to be the leaders."

In 1998, the school succeeded in getting accredited as a four-year college.

Now, the school enrollment is up to slightly less than 1,800 full- and part-time students, the number of faculty and staff has more than doubled to 477 and the school offers 32 associate and bachelor's degree programs. In 2003, the school opened a center in Towanda. Keystone is regularly recognized in the U.S. News and World Report "Best Colleges" edition with special notice of its small class sizes and amount of financial aid awarded to students.

As president emeritus, Dr. Boehm said, he will concentrate on raising money, but will also help in the school's quest to develop master's degrees which could lead to university status. If that happens, the school might not instantly become Keystone University because of the alliterative nature of its present name, Dr. Boehm said.

"Keystone College has a ring to it," he said.

Mr. Speicher said the board of trustees will conduct a nationwide search for a replacement with hopes of having one in place to begin the 2013-2014 school year.

"The object is to get someone who can make great use of the faculty and students and building on all the good things that have come about so far," he said.

Contact the writer: bkrawczeniuk@timesshamrock.comn October 1995: Edward G. Boehm Jr., Ed.D. becomes president of Keystone College; was senior vice president for institutional advancement at Marshall University in West Virginia.

n January 1998: Dr. Boehm announces the college will be offering degrees in culinary arts and occupational therapy assistant.

n May 1998: Dr. Boehm announces that the state Department of Education has approved Keystone College to offer baccalaureate degree programs.

n May 2000: Keystone College awards its first baccalaureate degree to Stacy Davis, Scranton.

n April 2003: Keystone opens its Towanda Center. Dr. Boehm says the new facility that will enable the college to expand offerings to residents of the Northern Tier.

n October 2006: Dr. Boehm is elected president of the Pennsylvania Association of Colleges and Universities for 2006-07.

n May 2007: Dr. Boehm and his wife, Regina, are honored with the B'nai B'rith Americanism Award

n May 2010: Dr. Boehm kicks off the $2.2 million renovation project of the Hibbard Center. The school received a $1 million grant from the state's Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program for the project.

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